SEAL Target Geronimo,
Inside the Mission to Kill Osama bin Laden
Saint Martin's Press (November, 2011)
An Inconvenient Bit of History
by Chuck Pfarrer
Operation Neptune's Spear, planned by SEAL Admiral Bill McRaven, was one of America's most brilliant special operations successes. Thirty-eight minutes on target, zero American casualties, and the terrorist mastermind of 9/11 sent to meet his maker. One for the history books... well, not quite.
In the six months since the mission, history, it seems, has been up for grabs. In the days and weeks after the raid the US Government floundered through a series of stories, corrections and walk backs regarding the operation. In the absence of definitive facts from the government, the story began to morph into an ugly tale of murder.
By August, the New Yorker magazine published a version of the raid that depicted the SEALS as hit men who blasted their way into the compound, firing indiscriminately, until they got to the third floor where they shot a woman and then murdered Osama bin Laden in cold blood. It is little wonder that the words Kill Mission tripped off the tongues of media pundits.
In order to write history, one needs access to the facts; the accounts of eyewitnesses, or, at the very least, access to people who know what actually happened. SEAL Target Geronimo goes to original sources, and I have no doubt that the operators and intelligence professionals who conducted this mission told me the truth.
But before I tell you what happened, let me tell you what did not. There was not a "45 minute firefight", or even a 20 minute one. There weren't enough bullet holes or broken glass to support this story-- and neither SEAL Team nor civilian casualties supported a tale of urban combat. Zero SEALs were killed or wounded, and only five civilians died, one slightly wounded. My research showed that only twelve bullets were fired during the entire mission.
The downed helicopter story was also suspect. Eye witnesses told me that the helicopter did not crash on insertion, but only after it had successfully landed assaulters on bin Laden's roof. Nor did the "crashed on insertion" story make tactical sense. If the lead helicopter went down approaching the target, why would its back up then divert outside the compound and deposit its load of shooters on the wrong side of a twenty-foot concrete wall? In addition, a close up inspection of the walls of the compound revealed no main rotor strike damage, and the tail rotor left behind was largely intact, and its blades undamaged, suggesting that it was not turning when it was thrown outside the walls.
Overhead video imagery confirms that assaulters were delivered successfully to the roof of the main building, and that the crash of the insertion helicopter came 12 to 18 minutes into the raid-- not at the outset. This live video feed was beamed into the White House. As the President and his entourage watched in horror, the helicopter was seen to lift off from the roof, turn tail and settle into the livestock pen next to the main residence. The cause of the crash is unknown, but may have to do with the catastrophic failure of two flight control systems. The stealth helicopter, now unflyable, was abandoned and blown up in place. Despite this accident, Admiral McRaven's SEALs completed their mission and returned to base without loss or injury. Bin Laden's corpse was flown to the carrier USS Carl Vinson where he was buried at sea.
The Administration's pushback started even before SEAL Target Geronimo hit its publication date. For the first time in history, the US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) singled out a military history book for criticism-- calling SEAL Target Geronimo "a fabrication", and branding me, its author, "a liar". Those are serious accusations to a third generation naval officer, and I take exception to them. But lost in the government denunciation was a statement that may provide an explanation of why the book was such an annoyance, at least to politicians. An AP article quoted a SOCCOM spokesman as saying, that Admiral Bill McRaven "...was concerned that the book would lead Americans to doubt the Administration's version of the story."
You may count me as a doubter, and an early one.
When politics is mixed with military history, the result is not often pretty. One need only recall the press stories involving Specialist Jessica Lynch, Ranger Pat Tillman or "Mission Accomplished" to know what happens when politicians put their spin on battlefield facts.
Indeed, the Administration's handling of the narrative could not have been worse: a premature, politically driven announcement, followed by a contradictory story, crowned by a highly negative magazine account and a television dramatization that depicted the raid as a cold blooded hit. What might have been an important success for the United States in the "information space" was turned into an unmitigated disaster. Reaction to the New Yorker article was immediate-- flags started burning all over the Middle East, and US Special Operations Forces were seen as a gang of murderers and thugs.
But worse, much worse, by almost immediately confirming that the United States had conducted the operation, President Obama rendered worthless hundreds of items of actionable intelligence-- enough to put Al Qaeda out of business, forever. As news of the raid spread around the world, Al Qaeda operatives, including Ayman Zawahiri, bolted for cover. The intelligence gathered by the SEALs was squandered in an instant-- bartered for a bump in the polls.
When the administration and the military failed to disavow the scabrous New Yorker article, I was appalled. The brave SEALs who pulled off this mission deserved better, and history deserved the truth. I wrote SEAL Target Geronimo to correct the record, and I stand by every word.
I've found that the most strident attacks against the book (and me) have been made either anonymously, or by people who did not witness the raid. The mission was filmed, in its entirety, by an RQ-170 Sentinel drone. The people who watched the mission live included: President Barrack Obama, VP Joe Biden, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Leon Panetta, Brigadier General Brad Webb, Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Tom Donilon, National Security Advisor, White House Chief of Staff William M. Daley, Tony Blinken, National Security Advisor to the Vice President, Audrey Tomason, Director for Counterterrorism for the National Security Council, John O. Brennan, Chief Counterterrorism Advisor to the President, and James R. Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence. These people saw the mission, and they saw it happen as I described it in the book.
Not one of these eye-witnesses has come forward to refute or even question what I have written.
I am certain that one, several, or perhaps all of these people will eventually write their memoirs, and it will be interesting to see what they say not only about the raid that killed Osama bin Laden-- but why they felt it wasn't necessary to come to the defense of an honest man who wrote the facts.
I have learned long ago to never be disappointed by people-- especially politicians.
The Navy SEALs who struck bin Laden's compound did so with the stealth and precision that has been the hallmark of Naval Special Warfare for more than 50 years. The facts of this operation are a vital part of our nation's history. The events at Abbottabad exemplify the professionalism and fighting spirit of the United States Navy. I have been honored to their story.
